Rixty Minutes
|code = 107}} "Rixty Minutes" is the eighth episode of the first season of Rick and Morty. It is the eighth episode of the series overall. It premiered on March 17, 2014. It was written by Tom Kauffman & Justin Roiland and directed by Bryan Newton. Synopsis Unimpressed with what's on TV, Rick installs cable that gets shows from other dimensions. Everyone uses special goggles to see their alternate selves. Plot The Smith Family are gathered around the television, invested in a 'Bachelor' style reality show. Rick expresses disgust at the quality of television, and Jerry challenges him to provide anything better. Rick destroys the existing cable box and installs his own: a cable box capable of receiving television across infinite dimensions. The shows featured in these alternate realities vary wildly, such as a Showtime crime show in a reality where people evolved from corn. Rick flips through the channels to show the endless possibilities, before the family sees Jerry in an episode of David Letterman, in a reality where he was a famous movie star. This excites the rest of the family, and Rick gets annoyed feeling that they are getting obsessed about the wrong things. Rick pulls out a pair of Inter-Dimensional Goggles that he throws into the kitchen, in which Jerry, Beth, and Summer chase after. Morty says he does not care about himself enough to see what his alternate self would be like, in which Rick congratulates him. The two then watch various commercials and clips from alternate realities. Meanwhile, Jerry, Beth, and Summer are in the kitchen taking turns using the goggles. Jerry sees himself doing cocaine with Johnny Depp while Beth sees herself operating on a person instead of a horse. Summer has trouble finding any other realities of her, except for a moment of the family playing Yahtzee. It's during this time that she first finds out that she was an unwanted pregnancy, and the news upsets her greatly. Seeing her parents achieve their dreams in realities where she was not born, she tells them that she is running away. The alternate realities of their lives shake Jerry and Beth to the core, and they decide that maybe it'd be better to spend time apart. Summer goes upstairs and begins to pack, and Morty attempts to console her. She attempts to push him away before he points outside to the graves in the backyard (from the episode "Rick Potion No. 9"). He reveals the truth that he is not, in fact, her brother but a brother from another reality. Morty tells Summer "Nobody exists on purpose, nobody belongs anywhere, everybody is going to die....Come watch TV?" Beth keeps the goggles on while laying on the floor of the kitchen, enjoying her alternate life. The television in the main room shows alternate reality Jerry having a drug-induced breakdown, stripped down to his underwear, his head half-shaven, and driving a mobility scooter on a freeway with droves of police cars behind him. Rick almost changes the channel, but Jerry yells at him to keep it. They watch as alternate reality Jerry arrives at the doorstep of an alternate reality Beth, telling her that he hated his life and regretted not continuing their relationship. Beth and Jerry are stunned, as they run to each other to embrace. In the post-credit sequence, the Smith family is watching the news in a Hamster-in-Butt World. The family asks Rick a wide variety of questions about the world until he begrudgingly creates a portal to the world so they can 'ask them yourselves.' Jerry excitedly calls it a family vacation and the Smith family spend a vacation in Hamster-In-Butt World where a photo montage show them all having a good time (even Rick at the end). Characters Major *Rick Sanchez *Morty Smith *Jerry Smith *Beth Smith *Summer Smith *Jerry Smith (C-500A) *Beth Sanchez (C-500A) Television *Alternate David Letterman *Ants in my Eyes Johnson *Real Fake Doors Salesman *Saturday Night Live cast **Piece of Toast **Two Guys with Handlebar Mustaches **Garmanarnar **Man Painted Silver Who Makes Robot Noises **Three Unknown Things **Hole in the Wall Where the Men Can See It All **Alternate Bobby Moynihan *Gazorpazorpfield *Jon *Trunk People *Unmuscular Michaels *Tophat Jones *Regular Legs *Baby Legs *Mrs. Sullivan *Mrs. Sullivan's Cats *Hamster in Butt World Inhabitants Deaths * Tophat Jones (commercial) * Jerry Smith (C-500A) (only deleted scene) Locations *Smith Residence *C-500A *Gazorpazorp *Reverse Height Universe *Hamster in Butt World Transcript View the full transcript of this episode here. Trivia *This episode would mark the first episode of a recurring theme in the series with the Interdimensional Television, where every season, there would be an episode where people would sit down and watch a bunch of television shows from alternate realities and dimensions that are completely ad-libbed by the actors. *Every commercial or teaser shown on the television as Rick and Morty watch other dimensional television programs was improvised for the episode's script by Justin Roiland, though some of them were re-recorded by other voice actors who were asked to copy Roiland beat-for-beat. This is evident in several instances, including Rick's comment that it "got an almost improvisational tone," and during "Two Brothers" and "Gazorpazorpfield" where Roiland starts laughing towards the end of each segment. The rest of the episode had only a few lines between Rick and Morty, and a brief synopsis on Jerry's slow-speed car chase. *This is the only episode to date to feature no characters (at least in-person) outside of Rick and the Smith family. *The entire episode (except the post-credits scene) takes place inside the Smith house. *Before TV release, the entire episode was split up into more than 100 15-second clips that were all posted on Instagram by the show's producers. They are still viewable on the account @rickandmorty. *The premise of this episode is similar to episode 4 of House of Cosbys, in which the characters watch snippets of bizarre alien television shows by way of an "intergalactic transmission receptor". *It is revealed that Summer was an accident, an unwanted pregnancy, as a result of Jerry and Beth's unprotected sex on prom night. *In this episode, it turns out that Summer is 17 years old, the same age that her mother had when conceived her. *It also turns out that Jerry and Beth were still underage when they married. *There's a theory that Fake Door Salesman is a humanoid version of Mr. Poopybutthole, whose first appearance happens in the episode "Total Rickall". *There is a deleted scene of Rick (C-500A) who visits his daughter Beth after he freezes and kills Jerry when he comes to bring her bird feed. *This episode is a satire of the detective genre by pointing out its absurdities. Quick Mystery and Baby Legs are both examples of this as they show what detective stories would be like if all of the literary complexities were removed. The detective genre is also made anti-climactic which Rick and Morty applies to various genres such as the time-manipulation genre when Rick freezes time just to get away with trashing the house in Ricksy Business. *The reality television genre is also satirised throughout this episode. An example of this is in the fictional version of The Bachelor in which the audience is mislead into believing the rose is for Cynthia until it is revealed to be for Veronica. This shows how Rick and Morty deconstructs the reality genre by presenting the audience with the misdirection used within the shows to create suspense. *The Blu-Ray release features special guest commentary from Walking Dead Crew Robert Kirkman and Scott M. Gimple. Cultural References *This title is a play on the phrase "sixty minutes," and the name of a popular American news magazine and TV segment 60 Minutes. *The song that plays when Beth and Jerry kiss and embrace at the end of the episode is Seal My Fate by Belly. *In the reality where Jerry is famous, all of the movies that Jerry was featured in are real life movies where he has taken the place of all the characters played by Tom Hanks. *Alternate Jerry's slow-speed police pursuit is a likely parody of O.J. Simpson's shortly before his trial - the slow-moving fleet of LAPD Chevrolet Caprice-like police cars similar to those used during the real chase pursuing him further justifies the reflection. *In the intro to an alternate reality's Saturday Night Live, the featured performers include a Piece of Toast, Two Guys with Handlebar Moustaches, a Man Painted Silver who Makes Robot Noises (which is likely a reference to Chris Parnell's SNL character "Kevin Aquarius" and/or Danny Baker from 30 Rock/TGS with Tracy Jordan), Gar Ma Nar Nar, three yellow creatures whose names the Announcer had a hard time enunciating enough to quote "I'll get back to that one", a Hole in the Wall where the men can see it all, and Bobby Moynihan (who was on this reality's "Saturday Night Live" for 25 years). On a related note, it was mentioned by Rick that Bobby Moynihan and a Piece of Toast hate each other due to some creative differences. *The jeep flip during "Ball Fondlers" is the same from the opening credits of the A-Team (the entire show concept seems like a more ridiculous version of A-team in fact). *When Morty comes back from talking to Summer, Rick tells him "you missed a preview of your dad's Citizen Kane". Citizen Kane is considered to be one of the greatest films of all time, so Rick is essentially saying "you missed a preview of your dad's masterpiece". *The trailer for the dead cat lady movies title is a reference to the movie Weekend at Bernies. *When Rick and Morty talk about Gazorpazorpfield's voice, they mention Lorenzo Music is still alive in that reality. Lorenzo Music was the most iconic voice actor of Garfield, and also provided the voice of Peter Venkman in The Real Ghostbusters. Music died in 2001, and was replaced by Bill Murray as Garfield's voice actor in the two Garfield live-action films. Coincidentally, Murray had also played the role of Peter Venkman in the two Ghostbusters films. *An alternate universe parody of the HBO series Game of Thrones appears while Rick is channel surfing, in which the character Tyrion Lannister is a tall person in a world of short people. Episode Connections *The deaths of Rick and Morty and their travel into a replacement dimension from the episode Rick Potion #9 was brought back up again in this episode. When Morty showed Summer the tombstones of that dimension's versions of themselves in her backyard and explained to her what happened, as a way of trying to convince her that "No matter what alternate dimension they're in, her family will always be her family." *The events of Raising Gazorpazorp are brought up when Rick and Morty watch Gazorpazorpfield. *A character featured in one of the commercials also appears falling out of a plane in Mr. Goldenfold's dream in the episode Lawnmower Dog. Site navigation it:Episodio 8 Category:Episodes Category:Season 1 episodes Category:Summer Episodes Category:Beth Episodes Category:Jerry Episodes Category:Anthology Episodes